


Keep You Near

by AlixanderFD



Series: The Flesh Not Seen [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Afterlife, Flash Fiction, Ghosts, M/M, Macabre, Memento mori
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:28:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22984036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlixanderFD/pseuds/AlixanderFD
Summary: A man rends himself to pieces in an effort to cope.—‘“You should go outside,” he says to me. “Look. The sun’s so big and orange.”He’s looking out the window from the armchair in the corner of the room. For all he fills the thing out, it might as well be a whole king size mattress. We live alone, and I can’t afford anything like an actual bed, so in the guiltiest way I’m almost glad he’s so not-there. He says he’s happy with things the way they are, but I think maybe if I didn’t sleep on the floor he’d at least be able to enjoy a comfortable couch without feeling ashamed of himself.’
Series: The Flesh Not Seen [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1651750
Kudos: 1





	Keep You Near

_You should go outside,_ he says to me. _Look. The sun’s so big and orange._

He’s looking out the window from the armchair in the corner of the room. For all he fills the thing out, it might as well be a whole king size mattress. We live alone, and I can’t afford anything like an actual bed, so in the guiltiest way I’m almost glad he’s so not-there. He says he’s happy with things the way they are, but I think maybe if I didn’t sleep on the floor he’d at least be able to enjoy a comfortable couch without feeling ashamed of himself.

His head’s like an LED in that fuzzy beam. I can’t stop looking at him. He barely blinks, too.

The chair screeches like heavy machinery when I get up and stretch. It bothers me plenty so I assume it bothers him too, but he acts like he doesn’t hear anything moving around in the first place. Even when I shuffle to the door and let the breeze roll inside, he’s staring kitty-corner out the opposite window, and the hairs on his arms don’t even prickle with goose bumps like mine do.

I think he likes to see me outside as much as he likes the hill basin and wildflowers I’m standing in. Vicarious joy is what I do for him. And there’s the harvest moon in the sky—not the sun, but it is orange and very large. Guess it looks warm, but we’re getting real close to weather when I’d be shivering out here. For another month or two I’ll still be able to do this, but with the days getting shorter, I’m not looking forward to seeing him go mute cause the window’s frosted over. I already can’t make him open up his mouth to eat. Or even tell me when he’s hungry.

God, I’m angry. I’m tapping on the window. He’s staring straight out at me and I tell him Stay with me, okay? I’m still here and you’ve gotta be too.

The days pass like icicles building down from the gutters. I need a shower. He needs a bath.

I take his hand and fold it into mine. He doesn’t turn to look at me, but I know he would if he could. My lips leave a faint sparkle where I kiss his knuckles.

You’d get more out of life if you were a coat on the rack, I say with mourning in my cheeks. My laughter rings hollow to my own ears; it peters out when I look back up and see his deadened eyes. I want to cry, but it’s not like it would help.

We lay together and I can’t get warm. His tepid skin makes the thermal quality of the wool blanket on top of us redundant, but I pull him into me like my life depends on it, and eventually I stop noticing the points where his chill meets me. It’s almost comfortable.

The crows start sounding like him when they squawk and croak. I hate it so much I stop going outside when staying in is an option. When it’s not, I carry bits of him in my coat pockets, touch them and suffer quietly. We’re people in little pieces, him with loose hairs all over the armchair and carpets and me still in all the places I carved out room to collect him. It barely hurts.

It barely hurts, I say. Needles don’t bother me anymore. Let me do this, alright, if not for you then at least let me do it for me.

He’s falling apart, y’know? It gets more obvious every day. When’s the last time he actually saw me when his eyes were pointed my way? I don’t know. I don’t want to think about it. What I have to remember is that he remembers me.

Ha! It’s really something. I’ve probably poured more of me into him than I have into myself. I could put his head on my own shoulders and be more Me than I’ve been this past year. Or his heart in my chest. If I did both maybe I’d be a real person again.

It’s not as cold today.

That fat orange cat has turned up at the porch again. Don’t think it’s noticed I’m here. It just kind of looks right past me and keeps walking... I don’t have any food to give it anyway.

I’m tired. A lot.

When I sit in the doorway and stare out over the porch, I hear his voice near the creek. My eyes refocus and I stand up, stretch, and go inside. Then tomorrow comes and I’m more tired than I was yesterday, and the day after that I start thinking it’s about time I threw my shoes on and headed down there.

The sun gets quiet. The moon gets bigger.

Yeah, it’s time. I’m carrying more pieces of him than ever. There’s practically none of me left.

I see him smiling with his bare feet in the water just on the other side of the stream. He watches me wade in and tips his head back, laughing. _You’re looking handsome_ , he jokes. I give him a smile of my own.

I missed you, I tell him, and I kiss his knuckles—warm and soft—while my eyes flutter closed.

I’m here now, so stay with me. That’s all we’ve gotta be is right here.


End file.
